Confugo : A Tale of Thomas and Dennis
by Flaggboy
Summary: Eyes of the Dragon Dark Tower A story of Thomas and Dennis' quest to find Flagg. DT7 Spoilers and slight AU in later chaps
1. Prologue Gateway to Mejis

_**Confugo:**_

_**A Story of Thomas and Dennis**_

_**The setting: **_

**_After _Eyes of the Dragon _and _Wizard & Glass**

**_before the fall of Gilead_**

_**Prologue**_

_**Gateway to Mejis**_

They had arrived at the thinny over a week ago, and had been arguing ever since. Neither of them had ever seen such an oddity in their life, and thus could not agree on what needed to be done regarding it. The only thing that they both could agree on was the fact that it was dangerous.

The thinny was in a small box canyon in the abandoned barony of Mekrob. As near as they could tell from the information they had gathered along the way, the population of Mekrob had largely perished in warfare some 5 years earlier. The few remaining survivors had picked up stakes and headed further southeast, where the people had yet to imagine such a character as Jason Fathom, much less get caught up in his revolution against the Affiliation.

. When they had crossed the border of this barony, they were less than a day behind Flagg and closing in every day. They had finally caught him at the edge of the canyon which was now causing all the strife. Flagg had disappeared into the canyon and had not come back out. There was only one way he could have gone.

Thomas knew that their pursuit of Flagg would be all for naught if they didn't take the chance and follow him through the thinny. But Dennis flat out refused. The fact that Flagg could pass through it meant nothing to him; Flagg was a centuries old wizard, and he was merely a butler from Delain. Who knew if he and Thomas would pass through unharmed?

Thomas was once again the first to wake up. He knew that as soon as Dennis woke up, the arguing would begin once again. Thomas made a decision: arguing was done. He would enter the thinny alone. If Dennis chose to stay behind, so be it. They had lost too much time already, and he'd be damned if he let Flagg's lead become any larger. They had been camping about a half mile away from the canyon, to dampen the sound of the thinny. Thomas gathered up everything that was his, and began to walk.

He reached the edge of the canyon, and bracing himself, looked down.

The thinny was a pale silvery pink luminescence, which stretched across the entire width of the canyon. Gathering his courage (and plugging his ears), he began to climb down.

He eventually reached the barrier and stood before it. He then looked back to the top of the canyon to check to see if Dennis had possibly followed him. He saw no sign of him, and turned his attention back to the thinny.

Hesitantly, he put his hand to the barrier, and he felt no resistance; his hand went right through it. He could still feel his hand (though he could not see it), so he decided to go for it, all at once. He jumped in to the thinny.

It was as if the whole world has suddenly become that silvery-pink luminescence. He could see only two things – the dirt on the ground, and some source of light coming from maybe 20 feet in front of him. Figuring there was nothing left to lose, he walked towards the light. After about 10 feet, he began to run towards it.

He reached the light source and his mouth dropped open in shock. He was outside of the thinny, but he was back in the box canyon.

He had a quick look around him and realized that, while it was _almost _the same box canyon, it wasn't exactly the same. The most obvious indicators were the layers upon layers of dead brush bordering the thinny, where his path inwards had been free of obstacle.

He turned around to look back at the thinny and received his second shock. While the thinny he had entered had been a ghostly pink, on this side of it it was a sickly green. He didn't know why, but he was suddenly filled with the knowledge that there was no going back through this thinny. While some existed that allowed passage both ways between worlds, this one was one way only. He set out to find his way out of the canyon, barely noticing the call of the thinny inside of his head.

At the top of the canyon, he found Flagg's familiar trademark, and it made him smile. The ashes of a campire spread into an unfamiliar ideogram which Thomas could only guess as to it's meaning. He realized with triumph that the ashes appeared to be fresh, no more than 3 days old. Flagg had waited for them.

He stood and cracked his back, taking in his surroundings. It appeared to be Mekrob, but a much more vital version. War had either never found its way to this version of Mekrob, or had been driven back. Thomas figured the first; he had yet to see anything powerful enough to drive away Jason Fathom's machines of war.

He also noticed that, while he had left Mekrob in the morning, it was just past sundown here. It enabled him to see that there was a town not too far away, and it most definitely looked inhabited. The final strains of _Hey Jude_ reached his ears, and he smiled again. They would remember Flagg in town, of that he had no doubt.

With newfound confidence that he might one day yet catch the wizard Flagg and make him pay for killing his mother and father, he set off down the road towards the seaside village of Hambry.


	2. Chapter 1 Reception

_**Chapter 1**_

_**Reception**_

Once upon a time, Flagg had been Thomas' trusted instructor and his father's royal council. Thomas' brother Peter had had numerous more qualified (and thus, more expensive) tutors of course; their father had felt that Flagg was a sufficient enough teacher for his youngest son.

When Thomas was 7 years old, Flagg had spent several weeks teaching him about the multiverse, and the tower at the center which supposedly held it all together. Flagg had emphasized that very few could traverse between the different mirrored worlds, though there might come a time when that might change. The last 3 beams were finally growing weak, Flagg had said absently, with the ghost of a smile on his face.

Thomas, never the most studious young boy, hadn't understood a word of it. But he had been eager to please the sorcerer, so he had paid attention as best as he could. Here, in what his brain insisted had to be Mekrob, he finally began to understand.

He had not spent enough time in Mekrob to grow very familiar with his surroundings there, but he had spent enough time to assure himself that the geography and topography here were nearly identical. He confirmed this by seeking out a hillside on the horizon, which he remembered he and Dennis making camp at not 2 weeks before, and finding it without difficulty.

He was beginning to think though that he had imagined the sights and sound of the nearby town, when he came across a sign by the road:

_Welcome Traveller,_

_The Barony of Mejis welcomes thee to the Township of Hambry._

_Though Hambry is a village that has known mostly peace,_

_Our land is still at war_

_As such, All Affilitation laws and practices_

_are to be observed while in town_

_If thou art a stranger to Hambry,_

_Please present thyself to Sheriff Ruiz immediately upon arrival_

Mejis. Not Mekrob. Close enough though to bring his lessons about the multiverse back to the front of his mind. As he walked further towards town, he occupied his time trying to remember everything about those lessons that he could. The one part of them that had always fascinated him was the concept of _Twinners_, counterparts for every person in every one of the worlds. He hadn't thought about this in a long time, but he now vividly recalled pressing Flagg for many weeks for the knowledge of how to contact a twinner of his own, for Flagg had been his only friend and he felt like he should have a friend his own age. What better than another version of himself? He could tell by the tone of Flagg's polite (yet stern) refusals that he indeed possessed this knowledge, but had no intention of passing it on to him.

The concept that had so fascinated him when he was a child now began to worry him as he grew closer to the village of Hambry. He was sure now that he was in a world which was not quite the one he had been born in, which could mean that his Twinner did exist here. This no longer excited Thomas, because on the heels of this idea came the idea that there might now be two Flaggs in this world as well. He did not want to imagine what would happen if they found each other and decided to join forces.

He finally reached the edge of town and could tell that this was a place that went to sleep early. The only business still open was the inn, the Traveller's Rest. He walked up to the doors and noticed with some amusement that there was a golden slingshot nailed to the wall above the doors. No doubt there was a tale behind that, and he was sure he'd find several people inside willing to tell him all about it. He took a deep breath, and stepped inside.

The patrons of the tavern (of which there were at least 50) were dressed in an odd combination of desert dweller and seafarer. Since they looked so strange to him, Thomas figured he must look equally strange to them, in his expensive (but well-traveled) royal traveling garb. Thomas had expected one of two things to happen when he entered: either nobody would take any notice of him at all, or everyone would notice him and a hush would fall from the mix of fear and curiousity.

What he got was somewhere in between. Several of the older patrons noticed him and began to whisper amongst themselves (he counted seven games of Watch Me, a game that he had been taught was not proper for royalty to play), while the younger and mostly drunker crowd paid him absolutely no mind. He sat down at the bar, right underneath the enormous heads of a mutant elk.

"The Romp normally don't approve of strangers sittin so close to 'im," said a voice from behind the bar. "But he'll make a 'ception for one so handsome."

An enormous woman stood up from where she had been resting beneath the bar, dirty glass in one hand, dirty washcloth in the other. She offered her hand to Thomas, and he took it. "Pettie. Proprietor, and hopefully future co-owner."

"Prince Thomas of Delain. Pleased to meet you."

At the mention of the word Prince, not to mention the strange manner in which he spoke, several more ears at the rest were now paying attention to the newcomer with new interest.

"Prince, you say…" said Pettie, not too terribly impressed. "Such a status don't hold much sway nowadays, so if you're looking for special treatment, you need to keep looking."

"You've misunderstood me Ms. Pettie," said Thomas, "and I apologize. It is merely my name as I have been taught to present it to others. You may simply call me Thomas."

Pettie considered this for a moment, and nodded. Thomas' manner of speech had gained more and more interest in the tavern, and he noticed that it had quieted down considerably since he entered.

A weathered looking man in his 40s appeared at Thomas' side and put his hand on Thomas' shoulder. "Which way lies Delain, stranger?"

Thomas tensed, as he knew that any answer he might give could only be a half-truth at most. "Far to the northeast. It has been over two years since I left."

The man grinned. "You came in from the northeast? We have scouts watching every road, Thomas of Delain. And they all report to me. How is it that I have not heard any news of you?"

Thomas took another deep breath. "I arrived here in the box canyon," he said quietly. He assumed he didn't need to elaborate.

He was right, for the reaction he had expected when he walked in to the bar finally happened: everyone in the bar was silenced. Several people dropped their drinks to the floor, and one old woman in the corner forked the sign of the evil eye and fled the tavern.

There was something in the man's eyes that Thomas decided was either fear, respect, or disbelief, but he couldn't figure out which one. "Do you mean to say," said the man softly, "that you came from the thinny?"

"I do not know what this thing is called," said Thomas, "but I came here through the silvery wall in the canyon. If a thinny is what you call it, then yes, that is where I came from."

To Thomas' astonishment, several more bar patrons got up and fled. Even more looked like they wanted to leave but were petrified with fear and could not move. He then noticed that the man at his side was now gripping his shoulder hard enough to bruise. Pettie had moved as far from Thomas as she could get without actually leaving the bar.

Thomas slowly turned his head to look the man in the eye. The man still had that ambiguous look in his eye, but Thomas decided that fear was unlikely to be a part of it. "Is it me they fear," asked Thomas, "or merely where I come from?"

"It is the thinny they fear," answered the man coldly. "That abomination destroys anyone who gets near it. Yet they just heard you claim to come from the other side of it."

Thomas nodded. "I know nothing of thinnys or their nature. I only know that the one I am following came to this place through it. And that there was no choice but to come through it as well."

Thomas briefly saw recognition in the man's eyes, but it was gone as soon as it came. "So you are not the first?" the man asked. "Who is this man you are following?"

Thomas motioned for Pettie to get him a drink, but she remained firmly planted on the floor, shaking, with her eyes focusing on anything but Thomas. He sighed, hopped over the bar and grabbed what he hoped was beer, hopped back over, and placed a gold coin on the bar. He took a drink, and began to speak.

"First of all, he's not a man at all. My brother Peter thinks he may have been born a man though. He was my childhood tutor, my mother's murderer, and my father's usurper. I've left behind the only home I know to make sure he pays for his crimes."

He took another large drink, and added, "and because of your 'thinny', I will probably never see that home again."

The hard look on the man's face was beginning to soften. "Nothing escapes my gaze in Hambry, son. What does he look like?"

Recognition flowed back in to the man's face as Thomas described Flagg's distinguishing features. When Thomas was finished, the man said simply, "He left three days ago. He never came in to town, but my men and I all knew that he was there."

The man observed Thomas with newfound wonder. Almost conspiratorially, he said, "One of my men attempted to approach him on the night after he arrived. He came back to us blind and mute." Thomas nodded sympathetically.

The man stood, and offered Thomas his hand. Thomas shook it hesitantly. "Harold Callahan, deputy sheriff. No doubt you won't be staying long Prince Thomas, but I'll offer you my assistance, such as it is, while you are here."

Thomas smiled. "Thank you. You're right, I'm sure I will set out in the morning."

"You're welcome to my extra bedroom," said Callahan. "My brother Barkie aint got much use for it. Got himself killed by some apprentice gunslingers last year." Callahan spat into the dust on the tavern floor. "Good riddance too; he was in the service of the Good Man."

Thomas' eyes widened in shock. "The Good Man! Jason Fathom is here too?"

Callahan looked at him quizzically. "Fathom? No no.. John Farson! Surely you've heard of him?"

Thomas decided that now was not the best time to give a lesson in the concept of twinners, so he simply nodded. "John Farson, yeah, that's what I meant."

Callahan smiled again, then looked over the bar. "Pettie! Get yer ass off the floor."

Pettie slowly stood up, and went back to her routine, though she still gave Thomas a wide berth. Thomas realized that the bar had still not regained it's composure, and felt that the sooner he left, the better. Callahan seemed to feel the same, for he was motioning for Thomas to follow him out the door.

Once they were outside, Callahan began to chuckle. "You're probably the most interesting thing to happen to this little pissant town since them gunslingers left. So if you're planning to stay, I'd get used to that kind of reaction."

"I really can't let him get too far ahead of me again," said Thomas, "so I don't believe I'll have to. Get used to it, I mean"

Callahan sized Thomas up once again, and nodded. "Even if you leave tomorrow, you'd best check in with the sheriff anyway. Even if it's just to be neighborly, Stanley Ruiz wants to meet all strangers that come through here."

Thomas nodded. "No problem, just lead the way."


End file.
